A methodological appraisal of experienced utility

I offer a methodological appraisal of the theory of experienced utility and discuss its application to welfare evaluation. I examine the philosophical limits of two temporal axioms – Separability and Time Neutrality – and investigates the informational basis of the theory by contrasting moment utility with remembered utility. I argue that remembered utility holds greater normative value than moment utility, as personal welfare judgments are more strongly determined by retrospective evaluations than by instantaneous experiences. While some underlying assumptions of the theory remain contestable, I propose refinements to measurement tools such as the Day Reconstruction Method (DRM), emphasising the importance to include the distance between two events being evaluated (temporal distance) and the relative weight of different time periods (temporal significance). These refinements aim to enhance the interpretive accuracy of experience-based data and to clarify how such data can inform welfare-relevant judgments.